Encountering Pain and Confusion in order to Heal

By Sheena Jonker

We need to encounter the pain and confusion head on so that we can heal. So, do we tell it like it is? Or do we tell it like we are?

We are all made up of a complex mix of our biology, our experience, what we’ve been taught, what made sense to us at the time, those who have influenced us, our suffering, our triumphs and I could go on.

So to answer the question, it’s probably a bit of everything. Both, and.

I spend my working life mediating high conflict and often complex legal disputes. This means that I spend a lot of time with people going through some of the most profound pain of their lives. In Criminal Justice and Civil Justice in the judicial system, the pain is often masked behind voluminous papers, warring legal teams, complex rules of procedure and the cumbersome of the bureaucratic. Lives are still falling apart, wealth and health is still being destroyed, but it may not have a human face. We lose sight of the pain.

In alternative processes like mediation we encounter the pain, the confusion, the torment head on. We also encounter the healing, the peace, the “just-ness” head on at various points along the way and at the end if we get all the way though to resolution. And that is why we do this work.

But we need to keep learning, keep avoiding assumption, finding new ways to remain open, compassionate and insightful. Especially when parties become stuck in the sheer woundedness of it all.

So I’m always seeking out new ways to learn of and understand the human condition in all of it’s messiness and beauty which can and often does exist all at the same time.

For Fear of Fear

I recently came across the work of Padraig O Tuama.

There is this Irish Phrase ar eagla no heagla that translates “for fear of fear”

What if the way we tell it, is the way it is, and the way we tell it is the way are and at that point where we are is in a place of being terrified of fear. So we can’t really be in the here, because we want to get out as quickly as possible and so we don’t stay and look around and learn what we need to learn.

Most conflicting parties I deal with are in a profound state of fear. More so, terrified of the fear.

In David Wagoner’s poem, “Lost”:

Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you

Are not lost. Wherever you are is called here

And you must treat it as a powerful stranger

Taking Courage to Stop and Look Around

Sometimes we help parties stand still and look around. And meet the powerful stranger. We help them be here long enough to learn what they need to. To learn things from the place they are in but wish they are not. Sometimes that is the only way they will be able to move from that place. From here.

One of our most important roles may be to assist conflicting parties in taking courage to stop and look around in the here. Whether they are here by disaster or by choice. What must be learned here? We help them discover that.

O Tuama tells the story of Jesus and the disciples and the boat and the storm and he says it is as if to say that only in the middle of a storm can we find a truth that will steady us.

Sometimes we assist parties to go into the storm to find that truth that will steady them.

“What is the name of the place you are in now?” O Tuama says “It requires close looking. It requires the dedication of observation and commitment to truth. To name it requires to be in a place. It requires as to resist dreaming of where we should be, and look around where we are.”

Sometimes we resist naming where we are. Words have power and we fear giving power to a place we don’t want to be in, by naming it.

Helping Parties to take Courage

Sometimes we are there to help parties to take courage to name the place they are in assuring them that it doesn’t mean they will stay there. Anger. Pain. Trauma. What if my telling it like it is and telling it like I am is an angry, excruciatingly painful mix of all that has happened, all that is and all that I feel. And what if the same mess of things is true for the person I am in conflict with.

Sometimes we help parties start here. Stand Still. Look around. Go into the storm. The truth needed to steady them may be found there. And it will take courage.

Sometimes we are there to literally help parties be here.

Social Power Series (2): Power and Privilege

Restorative justice and peacemaking are not mere ideals, they are practices that take place in a real world in difficult, messy terrain. (Ambassadors for Reconciliation, Myers and Enns, 2009)

This terrain may be shaped by historic and current inequality and violence in which some hold and exercise power more than others. In the first article I looked at gendered notions and how they affect or alter or give rise to social power, or the lack thereof.

“Perhaps …I am the face of one of your fears.

Because I am a woman, because I am black, because I am lesbian, because I am myself-

A black woman warrior poet, doing my work-

Come to ask you: are you doing yours?”

Audra Lorde, “Sister Outsider”

 The Genesis of Violence

I encounter far too many mediators who believe that anything can be mediated and that specifically lack insight into the dynamics of power at play within a conflict, be it gendered power dynamics, racial power dynamics, class dynamics, the stark imbalance in employer employee relations and the myriad ways in which excessive power and lack of power intersect.

I’ve spoken and written before, and often on the genesis of violence and the spiral of violence as explained in Camara’s Spiral of Violence and which I recommend for all Restorative Justice Practitioners and actually for anyone sincerely trying to make sense of the human experience.

The spectrum of peacemaking strategies from mediation to legal remedies to activism require that we develop and pursue a careful understanding of the realities of social power.

We are surrounded by powerful institutions, ideologies and personalities but we are not typically adept at recognizing, naming, and importantly challenging them. Those of us who seek to transform social conditions and bring about more just conditions in society must learn how to “read” patterns and practices of power. (Myers and Enns, 2009)

Power as a Gift

At a Christian theological level we assume that power is a gift and a good to be shared in a just manner and not a good to be hoarded (Refer to the manna of Exodus 16). Similar thinking is to be found in other faith traditions and humanist philosophy.

The ancient Hebrews in the judeo-christian tradition held the fundamental vision of “enough for everyone” and the Hebrew prophets constantly challenged the distribution of power in their world. In the same tradition, Jesus of Nazareth located himself on the margins, amongst the marginalized.

The Jesus of the ancient world and the Martin Luther King of our modern world understood the need first to be “disturbers of the peace”. Over and over we see how Jesus predicates his alternative, restorative practice for adjudicating violation upon a careful analysis of relative power in the community giving radical priority to the “least”, those with least power. (Myers and Enns, 2009)

Working to Promote Just Distribution of Power

So as ambassadors of peacemaking and restorative justice one of our underlying assumptions must surely be that we are to work to promote just redistribution of power rather than a pre-occupation with individual or group power as dominant culture unashamedly models. MLK spoke about the dire need for non-conformists.

Sometimes it’s easy to see power at work around us-a police raid, a corporate take-over, a factory closing down and mass retrenchments, the fulminations of the playground bully or the spectacular excess of a celebrity function. More often, though, power is less easy to see – it’s mystified, obfuscated or denied-especially by those who have it (Enns and Myers, 2009)

So where a white person insists on being “colour blind”, someone with tertiary education attributes his or her success comparable to others to sheer “hard work” or a man insists that he is not sexist, there may be terrains of privilege and power that are going unacknowledged or unnoticed.

Unaccountable Power

And when a bank CEO complains that he is at the mercy of market forces, or a millionaire politician dons culturally appropriated gear at a campaign function or a huge mining company advertises how much it is doing for the environment, we do well to exercise caution. Denial of actual power makes true accountability impossible. And unaccountable power is the true threat to establishing a just society.

So if we work in restorative justice or peacemaking on any part of the spectrum (as mediators, lawyers or activists), a central discipline should be our willingness and ability to apprehend critically how power is distributed in our own households and communities and in the broader societies in which we live and work.

Mapping Social Power

So how do we “Map” social power?

Power is a combination of nature and nurture. For our purposes we are looking at power socially rather than psychicly.

Of course we know and understand that someone who is marginalised can exercise tremendous spiritual power or that poor people can be inwardly deeply content. (Enns and Myers, 2009) I have often commented that I have encountered some of the most profound wisdom, joy and strength of spirit amongst people in shackdweller communities.

Social power is difficult to understand because it varies from context to context, and is usually unacknowledged by those who have it and wield it.

Four Capacities of Social Power

Social power can be understood as a combination of four capacities:

  1. Mobility the ability to be where one is “at home” and to move where one wishes. In my view the majority of South Africans living in suburbia where they are close to schools and workplaces are largely profoundly ignorant of the devastating and lasting legacy of apartheid spatial injustice that a large majority of our people are still subject to today.
  2. Access the ability to procure what one needs for health and well-being. If “at home” is far from schools, work opportunity and health care facilities then a large number of our people remain perpetually without power and “self-upliftment” is a virtual impossibility
  3. Self-determination the ability to make the decisions that most affect one’s life. In our context the rich typically lambaste the poor because the rich pay taxes and “subsidize” the poor. It is ignorance and lack of insight that allows the rich to disacknowledge that but for their exploitation of the labour potential of the poor and in many cases the super-exploitation of that potential they would not hold the social power that they do.
  4. Influence the ability to be heard seen and respected.(Enns and Myers, 2009)

In my next article under the theme of power and privilege I intend to look at the basic frameworks through which we perceive our social world.

Sources and Recommended reading:

Ambassadors for Reconciliation, Enns and Myers, 2009

Restorative Justice: Politics, Policies and Prospects. Van Der Spuy et al. (2009)

Trauma Release

I am busy with material updates for 2016 for our ADR and Mediator Training

Although mediators do not assume the role of counsellor, it is important that they understand how individuals and groups behave during trauma and what the residual effects of trauma might be.

Trauma is said to be anything that overwhelms our natural coping skills. So whether we are dealing with parties going through a divorce, workplace conflict, business dissolution or more patently high conflict community or political disputes, we are dealing with probably dealing with traumatized individuals or groups

A book I have found very useful in its practical application in restorative circle work as well as personal practical application (as a mediator one is regularly exposed to high conflict and traumatic circumstance) is Trauma Release Exercise by Dr David Berceli. It’s easily available on Amazon Kindle.

Happy holidaying and much peace

Sheena Jonker

Mediation Training including Court Annexed Mediation: training@adr-networksa.co.za

Mediation Processes: sheena@mediatorsa.co.za

ADR, Restorative Justice and Arbitration processes: sheena@adr-networksa.co.za

Access to Justice and public interest matters: sheena@accesstojustice.co.za

 

 

ADR and Mediator Training for the rest of the year and early 2016

Friends

We have completed our 5 day training program schedule for this year. Distance Learning Remains open to register and complete.

5 Day Training Early 2016

5 day training will resume in Durban, Johannesburg and Cape Town on the last Monday to Friday of January, February and March 2016

You can register until 25 November 2015 at 50 {db4c0d2959e302539fe96b7aa3161328ff99665e8aefb664444410c6414dd29e} of the normal fee (ie R 5999 instead of R 11 999) on any of the above programs or the Distance Learning Programs

In addition to that concession the first 10 registrations will receive a smart watch compatible with apple or Samsung, up to the value of R 2000. Specs and available colours can be requested

1 Day training in various aspects of ADR

For the rest of the year we will host one day workshops. Next Friday’s is as follows:

We are holding a one day ARBITRATION TRAINING next week follows:

When: 20 November 2013

Where: 11 Delamore Road Hillcrest, Durban and Constitution Hill Johannesburg and TBC in  Cape Town

RSVP: training@adr-networksa.co.za

Cost: R 1000 payable to ADR Network SA FNB Number 62488968888 Br 223726

Includes: manuals and certificate of attendance

We are holding a one day workshop in UNDERSTANDING TRAUMA FOR MEDIATORS as follows:

When: 27 November 2013

Where: 11 Delamore Road Hillcrest, Durban and Constitution Hill Johannesburg and TBC in  Cape Town

RSVP: training@adr-networksa.co.za

Cost: R 1000 payable to ADR Network SA FNB Number 62488968888 Br 223726

Includes: manuals and certificate of attendance

Email: training@adr-networksa.co.za

Kindest regards

Sheena Jonker

BA (Law) LLB (UKZN)

Mobile: 0843773340

Alternative Dispute Resolution, Mediation, Access to Justice, Restorative Justice

ADR Network SA (Pty) LTD sheena@adr-networksa.co.za for Private Dispute Resolution

ADR and Mediator Training training@adr-networksa.co.za

The Access to Justice Association of SA (NPO 135-398) sheena@accesstojustice.co.za for Access to Justice and Public Interest Matters

www.adr-networksa.co.za

 

 

Upcoming ADR Network SA-Accredited Mediator Training

Friends

A reminder of upcoming 40 hour mediator training from 3-7 August in Durban, Johannesburg and Cape Town.

The cost is R 11 999 with monthly payment options and up to 50% subsidies on motivation of financial need.

The Thursday of each program covers court-annexed mediation and can be done as a one day program for those with prior training and at a cost of R 1000

For Registration Packs please email training@adr-networksa.co.za

Peace

Sheena Jonker

sheena@adr-networksa.co.za

Latest News: ADR Network SA and Access to Justice

Hi Friends

A quick note to say that last week the Chatsworth Refugee Camp closed after 3 months negotiations with displaced foreigners. A group of 150 refugees were not willing to accept the offered repatriation or re-integration packages primarily since it would involve either going back into SA communities or returning to Burundi or DRC which they had all previously escaped from under war or emergency conditions. So either option is terrifying. Access to Justice lawyers secured their release from prison last Monday after they were arrested following their refusal to leave. They are very temporarily accommodated on a farm in KZN with all kinds of collateral considerations. On Friday we initiated a mediation process which seeks to generate options and find solutions. We are still in the fact finding or story telling phase and we urgently need more volunteer mediators to help listen and transcribe stories. Some have never ever got to tell their stories before. Not only will it strengthen our approach to UNHRC special interventions unit, but the process of being heard for the first time individually has powerful implications for all. If you can help, please get in touch at sheena@accesstojustice.co.za
For mediator training enquiries, please email training@adr-networksa.co.za

Peace
Sheena Jonker
0843773340